Blood's Shadow: The Lycanthropy Files, Book 3 (19 page)

“The boy, of course, refuses. The boar king tears him to pieces and finds him so delicious he vows to hunt the rest of his family down, but while he’s eating him, the friend sneaks up and beheads the boar king. His blood mingles with that of the slain boy and brings him back to life, and his family is happy to have him back even though he’s never the same again. Because—”

“You cannot be touched by the boar king whose name is Death and return to your family the way you were.”
The ghostly voice filled the room.

“Simon?” David stood up straight from where he’d been leaning against the doorframe. “Simon McCord? Is that you, lad? I’d know that voice anywhere.”

Chapter Twenty

The shadow disappeared, and the letters scattered in a blast of chill wind. We gathered them back up without saying anything. The delicate process of moving the ancient paper only aggravated my already foul mood.

“Why not just tell me what they say? Why show them to me?” I asked once we had them arranged again.

“Why not tell me the ghost was your father?” David countered.

“It’s not exactly a comfortable thing to say, ‘Oh, by the way, I think my father and your best friend is haunting me. He says hello and might pop by later.’”

David shook his head, but he smiled. “Words have power, Gabriel. You were named for the messenger archangel—that’s significant.”

I had always wondered. My name had always made me stand out among the Anguses and Ferguses and Charlies of my school. “What happened to my father, David? Was he torn apart by the boar king or the demon the Culloden soldier mentioned or some other kind of supernatural creature? My mother always told me a German shell had gotten him, and he hadn’t felt anything.”

“You’ve seen the pictures.” It wasn’t a question. He stacked the letters in preparation for putting them away. One caught my eye.

“Yes, I’ve seen the bloody, awful pictures of what was left of him. Stop—what is that one?”

He paused, and I picked up the paper by the corner and held it to the light. This one looked like it had been crumpled, thrown away, and then fished out of the dustbin. In penciled letters so faint as to almost fade into the wrinkles, I read a single word. “Wolfsheim? The
vargamore
who started the Order?”

“Yes, Wolfsheim. That one was retrieved during the first Great War from a street urchin who had lifted it off a gentleman I’d been following.”

“Who was the gentleman?”

“Someone I never had the fortune of knowing. He turned up dead. All these letters are pieces of a puzzle, and when put together, they show how the Order of the Silver Arrow never died but rather continued to play a part in the misunderstandings that occur between the human world and ours.”

“I heard the name ‘Wolfsheim’ again. Ah, right, from Reine.”

“Yes, she shows up every so often. Not sure how she fits in with all this, but she does seem to appear whenever the Order gets active.”

“She’s the one who mentioned it. She said the Institute was built along the same plan as Wolfsheim Castle, so she easily found her way around.”

“Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I don’t believe that’s coincidental.” David sat on one of the formal dining room chairs and grunted. I lowered myself onto another one.

“We can always talk to the architect. He’s one of us, and local. But first, tell me about the Order and what you think it had to do with my father’s death.”

“Your father was no ordinary soldier, Gabriel. Simon McCord was a spy, but not for the Crown. He of course answered to the Council and was to gather information on both sides, but especially on the activities of the Order on the continent because we suspected they were involved somehow.”

“Right, particularly with the Nazi concentration camps. It sounds like their agenda.”

“Aye, if Wolfsheim could have found a way to do that to us, he would have.”

“How old would he be now? You said he got started in the eighteenth century, and no one knew how old he was then.”

“Right, and even then he appeared as an older gentleman, so one would think he had a few hundred years on him already. This conversation requires a drink. Whiskey?”

“Please. And damn. He’d be five hundred years old by now at least. If he’s still alive, which is highly unlikely, even for us.”

David poured drinks for us from a decanter on a sideboard. I wondered if he had one in each room of the house.

“It’s unlikely but not impossible,” he told me and handed me a drink.

I took the heavy cut glass tumbler from his hand and looked at the volume of liquid in it. “I hope you don’t mind a houseguest if you expect me to finish all this. My liver doesn’t have as much practice as yours.”

“Just drink up. I have plenty of room.”

This stuff had more peaty flavors to it than the first whiskey he’d given me, and I suspected he didn’t drink it as often as the other. It burned going down and left a smoky scent at the back of my palate and sinuses.

“Okay, what did you need to lubricate me to tell me?” I asked once I finished half the glass and set it on the table. It burned like a fire in my belly.

David finished his glass, and his eyes had gotten red-rimmed and teary. “Your father had no business being near the battlefield where they found him. None. He was supposed to have been in Antwerp with the Belgian resistance.”

“Brugge isn’t that far from Antwerp,” I said. “But what was he doing there?”

“He was either lured or tricked into going there.” David looked into the fire. “I wish he could tell us.”

“I’ll ask him the next time he appears.”

David snorted. “That’s the problem with ghosts. Considering he died violently and is here rather than there, he’s likely lost a lot of his memory with the transfer. I suspect if he could, he would’ve told us by now. When did he start visiting you?”

“The day of the murders at the Institute. I swear I hadn’t seen him before.”

“That speaks of a connection, now, doesn’t it? The demon on the battlefield and the one in our midst.”

“But why?” I swirled the drop of amber liquid at the bottom of my glass. “I can see how they would be interested in the reversal process, but how could that be related to a trap and murder in the Second World War?”

“If you figure that out, you may solve both mysteries.”

Now that Selene was opening up to me, I hoped she’d tell me why the scarred Englishman had been at the murder scene and arrange for us to meet peacefully. I needed to know what he’d seen and why he was spying on us. My instincts told me he hadn’t been the murderer but might have if given the opportunity.

Yes, Selene was in more danger than she realized if this was all connected. Luckily I didn’t mind keeping an eye on her.

No ghosts or visions bothered me during the night, and I made it to Lycan Village in time to visit the crystal and magic store where Selene had gotten the tarot cards. Veronica Chalice’s shop smelled of herbs and incense and other fruity and earthy scents. I never claimed to be a sensitive, but whenever I walked in there, I felt tingles along my spine, at the base of my skull, and along my fingers.

Veronica herself greeted me and caught me flexing my hands and rubbing my thumbs over my fingertips to dispel the feeling that they were waking up after I accidentally slept on and numbed them.

“I just got some new fluorite in,” she said. “It’s itching to be picked up and held. Maybe it’s calling to you?”

She plucked a round green and purple stone the size of a large marble off a stand and handed it to me. Its coolness dispelled the tingles.

“It likes you,” she said, and her smile lit her entire face like she’d made a royal match. “It’s been a while, Investigator McCord. What brings you in today? Surely the fluorite didn’t call to you all the way out in Shady Acres.”

“No,” I said and handed it back to her. She placed it on its stand among some other brightly colored stones of various shapes. “I’m here as part of a case, I think.”

“You think?” She raised iron-gray brows the same color as her long, flowing hair. Today she wore a dress the color of storm clouds, and her hair and clothing blended together to give an impression of rain and sorrow.

“Do you recall selling one of your local tarot decks to a young woman with red hair?” I asked. “I know it’s a lot to ask you to remember one customer considering how busy you are during the tourist season.” Indeed, it surprised me how quiet her shop was, but I imagined a lot of the tourists were sleeping off their Solstice ceilidh hangovers.

She picked up a clear round ball. I raised my eyebrows.

“Clear quartz. It helps me think,” she said before I could ask.

“Oh, you don’t gaze into it and get the answers?”

She grinned. “That’s not one of my talents, I’m afraid. Now hush if you want me to remember your redhead.”

“It’s actually not the redhead I’m so much interested in.” I coughed when she gave me a skeptical look. “Okay, maybe I am interested in her, but the deck intrigues me the most.”

“Oh, I remember her now. An American, right? Poor girl seemed troubled, more so than my average patron.”

“That’s probably her, then. Big blue eyes?”

“Yes, and a delicate face. Unique for one like you.” She didn’t say lycanthrope or werewolf out loud; most of us didn’t since few knew about us, and I appreciated her discretion.

“Oh, we don’t tend toward ‘delicate’?” I couldn’t resist teasing her. “What are we, then?” I shook my head. Something about the shop made it hard for me to concentrate, but it was also that since Veronica knew who and what I was but didn’t have any kind of agenda with me, I could relax around her.

“You’re sharp, clever, tough. Your bones tend to be thick and strong, your jaws square and your shoulders broad. Even the women. Lady Morena? She could stop a lorry.”

“Why is that, do you think?”

“I’m a psychic, not a doctor. Perhaps it’s all the running over uneven ground. It builds up your bone thickness and density. Or that your bones have to be strong the way they’re reshaped and molded. Otherwise, they’ll break.”

“Do you think the redheaded American is in danger of breaking?”

She looked at the quartz in her hand, and a little line appeared between her eyebrows when she pondered. “No, but she carries a great burden she’s had for a long time, and recent events have only made it worse. Coming here was a last resort for her. Her type—and by that I mean scientists—don’t seek out magical solutions.”

“What else did you give her?” I asked. “Or sell her.”

Veronica flashed a quick smile. “You know I’m a fair saleswoman, Inspector. I wouldn’t have sold her anything that wouldn’t help her.”

“What do you know about these?” I asked and pulled out the two Major Arcana cards I’d “borrowed” from Selene the other night. She took them from me.

“They’re from the deck I designed,” she said. “What else do you want to know?”

“Well, what inspired you to draw these particular people?”

She handed them back to me. “Some of my paintings come to me in dreams, some in visions. I walk through the fields a lot. Perhaps something inspired me out there.”

“You’re lying to me, Veronica,” I said. “If you’re frightened of these two, I understand why, but it’s important for me to know who they are, or at least who they are to you.”

She turned her back on me and grabbed a soft cloth, which she polished the round quartz with. She then placed it on a plastic holder on a brightly lit shelf and stepped back and gazed at it.

“Veronica,” I pressed, “I’m serious. People have been killed, and the man is the one who is connected to whatever is keeping Selene’s lost object.”

“I cannot tell you much about him,” she said, “only that he is not like me or even like you or the others you have been associating with. He is more like the Moon.” Again, I admired her ability to avoid saying names or anything else that could summon one of them.

“So why is he the devil in the pack?”

“He once was good, but bitterness and the desire for revenge have turned him against others. If you’ve seen him, you noticed the scar on his cheek. That was made by an iron weapon wielded by one of your kind at Culloden. His imperfection prevents him from accessing his full power or returning to his home, and so he has sworn revenge and has proven to be an eager mercenary for those who seek to harm you.”

She turned to me, and I saw the tears in her eyes.

“I didn’t mean to upset you,” I said.

“You place me and every one of your kind in danger by pursuing this line of investigation.” She shook the cloth at me. “And I fear I have made a grave mistake by using his image, even without the scar, if someone has been able to recognize him on the cards.”

“You knew the risk when you painted him.”

She bowed her head. “It was a compelling dream, and I had to.”

“What of her?” I asked and pointed to the moon card. “I can’t decide if she’s harmful or not.”

“The moon reflects the light from the sun, and while it may give clarity, it also paints with confusion because you know better than I that objects seen by moonlight do not give away all their secrets.”

“True,” I said. “But that doesn’t really answer my question.”

“I don’t have an answer, Investigator, only that while she brings confusion, she can also give enlightenment by helping you see things in a different way.”

“That makes sense from our interactions so far, but I fear she is going to try and exact some sort of price from me.”

“Her kind will always seek some sort of advantage. Don’t let her, if you can.”

“And did you see her in a vision as well?”

“No,” Veronica told me. She plucked the fluorite off its holder and held it out to me. “She commanded that I paint her and include her in my deck, and I couldn’t refuse. That you’re here tells me that she already has some power over you, so please take this in the hope it will help you keep your clarity.”

“Thank you, but why this and not the quartz?”

“It likes you. I suspect you’ll need more than just that before this is all over. Take this ribbon and crystal holder and keep it on you always, even when changed.”

I didn’t relish the idea of a stone marble bouncing against my chest, but I didn’t tell her that. I pulled out my wallet to pay her, but she stopped me.

“Consider it a gift,” she said. “One given without conditions.”

“Is there such thing?”

“I suppose you’ll find out.”